Cameron K. Murray — Reteaching economics in practice

Reforming economics teaching has been a heated topic of debate since the financial crisis. My personal views on this align closely with The University of Manchester’s Post Crash Economics Society (PCES), who have been calling for a pluralist approach that would rid economics teaching of its neoclassical core, and replace it with a critical study of economic questions and the diverse methods and approaches being taken to understand and answer those questions. The group Reteaching Economics has similar aims. Certainly a focus on empirical methods would be elevated to a core element, as the question of how can we know things is a primary concern to critical analysis. In all such an approach is not an excuse to avoid mathematics, but to embrace a the wide range of mathematical tools in use.

Change like this is a difficult task, and will ask a lot of students and teachers alike. But in my view it is also a difficult task to teach and learn the bland, abstract and often irrelevant economics that fills the undergraduate textbooks today. Even very complex concepts can be reduced into small components with memorable analogies that make them digestible. And if done right, a new approach should trigger more of a desire in students to learn and apply these new concepts and tools.

I have tried to shift my own teaching towards this approach. The purpose of this post is to share an example of taking an existing course, and the various constraints that came with it, and shifting it towards a more critical and pluralist teaching approach.…

Fresh economic thinking

Reteaching economics in practice
Cameron K. Murray